Tube noise in Fitzrovia [3]

Andrew Dismore: How frequently do TfL plan to carry out rail-grinding in the Fitzrovia area until a more permanent solution to residents’ noise nuisance is implemented? What is the timeframe for resolution of the complaints here?

The Mayor: I continue to press Transport for London (TfL) to resolve all residential noise complaints as quickly as possible.
Further rail grinding in the Fitzroy Square area of the Victoria line is scheduled for spring 2020. TfL will continue to take regular noise measurements, to determine how often rail grinding should be carried out.
TfL is also trialling an alternative track fastening, manufactured by Delkor, which could be installed in this area. TfL are continuing to progress further design and feasibility work to confirm their suitability, and I have asked that TfL officers update you when further information is available.

Child protection (2)

Caroline Pidgeon: The Her Majesty's Inspectorate of Constabulary and Fire & Rescue Services' post-inspection report on the Metropolitan Police Service's child protection practices noted that not all of the officers and staff within the new Basic Command Unit safeguarding teams had received the training they needed to carry out their roles, which led to some investigations being passed onto officers who did not have specialist child abuse investigation training. In response the Metropolitan Police Service has said it intends to train 3,000 staff in safeguarding. Please provide a timescale for when this training will be complete.

The Mayor: The Basic Command Unit (BCU) Safeguarding model went live in February 2019 and has a complement of around 2,500 posts (up to and including Inspector rank).
Current Metropolitan Police Service (MPS) systems do not allow individual training records to be centrally examined so it is not easy to provide a definitive breakdown of safeguarding officer training. However, the workforce of such a large organisation is constantly evolving and therefore training will be an ongoing process rather than ‘complete’.
Safeguarding officers are currently required to attend a 1-week safeguarding induction course. Those in Safeguarding Investigation Teams (around 1,770 posts) must complete a further 2-week specialist safeguarding course and a 2-week specialist witness interview course.
The MPS also continue to review training content to identify opportunities for the use of Continuous Professional Development (CPD) tools where appropriate.

Track Grinding Across the TfL Network

Jennette Arnold: Please provide details of the track grinding programme across the TfL network during 2020.

The Mayor: The table below sets out Transport for London’s planned track grinding programme across the Tube network during 2020. This programme is provisional, and subject to change which is dependent on operational requirements.
Line
Planned dates for rail grinding (2020)
Bakerloo
November, December
Central
January, February, March, April, October, November
District
February, May, August, September
Hammersmith & City
May, September, October
Jubilee
March, May, June, July, November
Metropolitan
March
Northern
January, February, March, April, October, November
Piccadilly
May, June, July
Victoria
April, May, October, November

Counter Terrorism (2)

Navin Shah: MOPAC’s annual report states that 64% of Londoners don’t know how to seek help from the authorities if they feel someone is being radicalised. Considering this, do you foresee extending the Countering Violent Extremism programme for longer than the year it has been currently extended for?

The Mayor: I want City Hall to lead from the front in tackling extremism and in light of my CVE Programme’s recent report, I committed new investment totalling more than £1 million to fund an ambitious new City Hall CVE Programme during 2019/20. This Programme has achieved much already but as the tragic London Bridge attack and other foiled terrorist plots have shown this is a vitally important area of work and so the CVE Programme will continue in 2020.

Forensics 3

Steve O'Connell: For each of the years December 2016 to November 2017, December 2017 to November 2018 and December 2018 to November 2019, what is the average length of time to process digital forensics, broken down by crime type?

The Mayor: Digital examinations break down into three categories:
Level 1 – The majority of phone exhibits that are examined by officers using self-service kiosks. However, they are done on a case by case basis by the officers on stand-alone terminals, as such there is no central information source.
Level 2 – Phone exhibits too complex to be handled by the self-service kiosks and computers for non-complex case and are handled at the digital Hubs within the borough command units.
Average processing time for Levels 2 and 3 are detailed below.
The turnaround time of complex case mobile phones has been impacted by the ever-increasing volume of data and the complexity of the software that is being seen. Ongoing work is being carried out as part of the Optimising Forensics Project, to both have a positive impact on all turnaround times and implement a Management Information tool that goes across the organisation.
Level/item
2017
2018
2019
2 /Phones & Computers
3 months unless critical
3 months unless critical
3 months unless critical
3/Phones
4 months
9 months
13 months
3/Computers
3 months
3 months
4 months
3/Cell Site
Critical dates or 35 days
Critical dates or 35 days
2 months
3/Audio
Critical dates or within 28 days where no date informed
Critical dates or within 28 days where no date informed
Critical dates or within 28 days where no date informed
3/Video – Edits
1 month
1 month
1 month
3/Data recovery
3 months
3 months
4 months
3/Facial
4 months
28 days
6 weeks

Forensics 2

Steve O'Connell: For each of the years December 2016 to November 2017, December 2017 to November 2018 and December 2018 to November 2019, what is the average length of time to process DNA forensics, broken down by crime type?

The Mayor: DNA exhibits are processed in four categories:
Average Days
Sexual Offences
Violent Offences
2017 – 18
164
152
2018 – 19
125
115

Forensics 1

Steve O'Connell: For each of the years December 2016 to November 2017, December 2017 to November 2018 and December 2018 to November 2019, what is the average length of time to process all forensics, broken down by crime type?

The Mayor: The MPS Forensics Service does not currently have a single over-arching case management system that enables us to provide the relevant information requested. When a specific enquiry is received, the details of a specific crime or exhibit can be established quickly. At a management level, the monitoring of turnaround times is done by departments, then grouped by priority, according to the type of work that the department completes. Furthermore, the range of disciplines and complexity of different processes, depending on the discipline, means that a single average turnaround time cannot be established and attempting to break this down by crime type is further complicated.

UK Modern Slavery Helpline (2)

Unmesh Desai: Will you write to the Home Secretary asking that the Home Office directly fund the UK modern slavery helpline?

The Mayor: I agree that the helpline should be funded by a national government department moving forward and we are working with the APCC who have written to the Home Office regarding future funding. I have also been assured by the charity Unseen, who run the helpline, that they are working with the Home Office to put in place a longer-term sustainable funding mechanism which will provide further stability to the helpline.

Rejection of 4 July 2019 London Assembly Motion on Croydon Tram Crash

Keith Prince: On 11 November 2019, a member of the public wrote to the Chair of the London Assembly alleging that you made 6 false or misleading statements in your 31 October 2019 letter rejecting the Assembly’s 4 July 2019 Motion, in support of GMB Union Resolution 412 which asked you to appoint an Independent Investigator, to discover why TfL failed to submit Fatigue Audit IA 17780 to the Croydon Tram Crash Investigators and the police. Can I have an undertaking from you that you will respond to these allegations in writing and supported by facts?

The Mayor: The Deputy Mayor responded to the letter to which you refer on 9 January 2020.

Action Fraud

Andrew Dismore: Are you satisfied with the performance of Action Fraud as the best way to investigate complaints from fraud victims in London?

The Mayor: Action fraud is governed by the City of London Police and their complaints system is overseen by the Commissioner of City of London, Ian DysonQPM and the National Fraud Intelligence Bureau. City Hall is monitoring the service received by victims of fraud. A review of the service will fall into Sir Craig Mackey’s review into Serious Organised Crime.

County Lines

Tony Devenish: What the Met is doing to target so called Drug Lords to cut off funding and logistics support to County Lines, and would the Deputy Commissioner offer a private briefing for Assembly Members on the subject?

The Mayor: The Met has been tackling criminals importing and selling drugs in London for many years, working alongside county forces. The MPS adopted a partnership approach to tackling county lines through the formation of the National County Lines Coordination Centre (NCLCC) in September 2018, which sits as a hub within the National Crime Agency, and there have been convictions attributable to ‘county lines’ in recent years.
The MPS are currently undertaking a pilot project tackling County Lines that emanate from London, the biggest exporting area of lines. This has focused on those offenders who own the drug lines, and are therefore the key players in setting up the networks of young people to transport and deal the drugs in counties across the UK.
The work has utilised resources from across frontline policing and other business groups to ensure that those behind this exploitation are fully investigated and criminal assets seized where possible.
A senior officer involved in co-ordinating this work will gladly brief Assembly Members on the Met’s work to tackle county lines.

Knife bins (1)

Susan Hall: How many knife bins have there been in London in each month since 2015/16?

The Mayor: There are currently 25 bins across London provided by the charity Word 4 Weapons.
There were 30 bins in London in 2015/16 but five were removed at the end of their useful life in 2018. Word 4 Weapons is supported by faith groups, charities, philanthropists and councils. The MPS has funded Word 4 Weapons.
Up until 2018, Word 4 Weapons records were not kept on a monthly basis, but the number of bins has remained stable since. Bins are regularly maintained and, where necessary, removed and reinstalled to ensure they are fit for purpose. Design specifications for the bins have improved during the years to reflect the life of a knife bin, deterioration through wear and tear and security of the units.
A map detailing where the knife bins are installed can be found on Word 4 Weapons website. https://www.word4weapons.co.uk/bin-locations/
The charity has collected over 40,000 knives and weapons since 2009.

Counter Terrorism (1)

Navin Shah: Senior figures in the police and domestic violence services say that there are links between perpetrators of domestic violence becoming dangerous extremists, and also of children who witness domestic abuse being susceptible to radicalisation. The co-chair of your Violence Against Women and Girls Board, Joan Smith, has written a book on this very issue. Are you doing any work to investigate this area of crossover between violence against women and girls and countering extremism?

The Mayor: My Countering Violent Extremism (CVE) Programme recently delivered a comprehensive city-wide engagement exercise in this policy area. This included engagement with stakeholders across Violence Against Women and Girls (VAWG) work strands where participants spoke about the overlap between the perpetration of violence towards women and girls and participation in extremism (including terrorism).
Whilst practitioners universally agreed that violence against women and girls could not be used as an infallible pre-cursor to radicalisation, they did agree that this could be a potential warning sign particularly if accompanied by other indicators. Moreover, they warned of the dangers of exposure of young people to violence against women and girls, citing this as a potential red flag for possible later vulnerability to radicalisation.
My Programme included a recommendation that the government should immediately commission more research into the overlap between violence against women and girls and participation in extremism. Meanwhile, my City Hall CVE and VAWG teams will continue to work closely together.

Announcements on the London Underground

David Kurten: To ask the Mayor what work TfL has carried out to study the efficacy of continuous health and safety and security announcements on the consciousness of the travelling public.

The Mayor: Transport for London (TfL) values the awareness and vigilance of customers as part of the London Underground network’s security regime.
The UK Government has made the frequency of health, safety and security announcements a statutory requirement. The content of these announcements has been derived by the Department for Transport after consultation with experts and reviews involving public focus groups, aimed at finding the most effective message to encourage customers to look out for and report security concerns to the police.
Customers on London Underground regularly report unattended items and potentially suspicious behaviour, and TfL has seen safety incidents reduce when announcements are used effectively at key locations.
TfL refreshes messaging regularly to get people's attention and increase the potential for the message to be consciously heard.

Delays 2

Keith Prince: How many Underground trains have been delayed or cancelled as a result of drivers being unavailable? Please provide an annual breakdown since 2015/16

The Mayor: London Underground (LU) typically run over 96 per cent of its scheduled services. The number of train journeys which are impacted by drivers being unavailable is not recorded.
LU has significantly increased the level of service it provides compared to 2015/16, as a result of the introduction of Night Tube services and a world-class 36 trains per hour on the Victoria line. Increased frequencies have also been introduced on the Northern and Jubilee lines.
In 2018/19, the total number of train trips scheduled to be operated by LU was 3.25 million, an increase from 3.16 million in 2015/16.

Joint Waste Crime Unit

Unmesh Desai: How will the Met work with the newly established Joint Waste Crime Unit set up by the Environment agency to tackle the problem of Waste Crime in London?

The Mayor: The MPS will continue to provide support for operational and enforcement activity to the Environment Agency where illegal waste sites are identified.Where potential modern slavery offences are identified, the MPS will work to safeguarding any victims, pursue and prosecute offenders, and dismantle Organised Crime Groups in collaboration with domestic and international partners.

Supporting Policing in Barking and Dagenham

Unmesh Desai: A constituent has raised concerns about visible cuts to police services in Barking. Please can you detail the ways in which you have sought to support the force in Barking and Dagenham and mitigate against the cuts as a result of reduced government funding?

The Mayor: I have done everything I can to support policing across London, including Barking and Dagenham, taking the difficult decision to increase the policing precept of council tax and reinvesting business rates into policing. This has allowed the Metropolitan Police Service to recruit 1,000 more officers than would otherwise be affordable and has seen officer numbers rise to 31,000, from the lowest they fell to, 29,654 in October 2018.
In accordance with my commitment to restore neighbourhood policing, all wards across London are allocated at least two Police Constables (PCs) and one Police Community Support Officer (PCSO). These dedicated ward officers remain within their wards and are only ever abstracted from them to assist with major events, for example the Notting Hill carnival or Extinction Rebellion protests.
I have, and continue to, vociferously lobby government to reverse its damaging cuts and provide the investment that London needs. Whilst I welcome the government’s belated acceptance of the impact of its cuts and promise of 20,000 new officers nationally, we still do not know what the final allocation to London will be or how they will be fully funded.